Drink Driving

If you drive whilst under the influence of alcohol, it's not just your licence that you are risking.

Driving is a task that should demand our full attention. Alcohol can seriously impair your ability to concentrate and physically control a vehicle while driving. Over the years, drinking and driving has become less socially acceptable, but despite an increased awareness of the dangers, nearly one in six road deaths involve a driver who is over the legal alcohol limit.

The dangers of driving drunk are not confined to the time immediately after you have been drinking. You may still be over the legal limit many hours after your last drink and time is the only way you can get alcohol out of your system. Sleep, coffee and a large cooked breakfast do not speed the process up.

What is a unit of alcohol

When asked "what is a unit of alcohol?" most people will state half a pint of beer, a glass of wine or a measure of spirit, but unfortunately it isn’t quite as simple as that.

A unit of alcohol is defined as the volume of alcohol that the body can process and remove from the system in one hour. But even that is not straightforward as every body will process alcohol at different rates depending on size, age, fitness levels etc

In general terms however, the facts are:

Whilst drinking for the first hour the body does not process any alcohol as it is being absorbed into the body

On average the body will process 1 unit of alcohol in 1 hour.

If you drink 10 units of alcohol it will generally take 11 hours to be totally out of your system.

Not every one is the same. Some will take a lot longer to process the alcohol than others.